Dell XPS 13

This ain't no MacBook Air clone. Sure, the Dell XPS 13 ($999.99 direct) will be compared to the Apple MacBook Air 13-inch (Thunderbolt) ($1,299 direct, 4 stars), because all 13.3-inch ultrabooks are. But instead of building just another skinny aluminum wedge, Dell has lavished design and, dare we say it, craftsmanship on Intel's ultrabook concept. The result stands with the Lenovo IdeaPad U300s ($1,495 direct, 4 stars) and Editors' Choice HP Folio 13 ($1,048.99 direct, 4 stars) as the status symbols of the category. And if you can forgive its skimpy port selection?really? not even a memory-card slot??it could be the most tempting of the lot.

At 0.7 by 12.4 by 8.1 inches (HWD), the XPS 13 is one of the most compact ultrabooks?according to Dell, 14 percent smaller in volume than the MacBook Air 13-inch. Certainly the 2.96-pound portable won't be a burden in your briefcase. Like most ultrabooks, the Dell XPS 13 comes in plain and fancy configurations. The $999.99 base model tested here includes a 1.6GHz Intel Core i5 processor and 128GB solid-state drive, along with 4GB of RAM and Windows 7 Home Premium. Stepping up to the $1,499.99 version gets you a 1.7GHz Core i7 chip and a 256GB SSD.

Design
The Stealth bomber wishes it had as many high-tech materials as the XPS 13. The top cover and a ring around the base are machined aluminum, while the base itself is carbon fiber composite. The palm rest is magnesium alloy with soft-touch paint. Finally, the nearly bezel-free 13.3-inch display is covered in edge-to-edge Gorilla Glass that adds durability and looks gorgeous (think of the best smartphone or tablet screen you've seen).

The overall effect is striking, from the silvery aluminum cover to the metal plate on the bottom with etched Windows and Intel logos (no stickers on the palm rest!). It's also sturdy, with virtually no screen flexing and no vibration during typing. Our only complaint is that, when closed, there's almost no protrusion or screen edge to grip, making the Dell hard to open.

The screen settles for the 1,366 by 768 resolution that's the baseline among netbooks, missing the chance to impress us with the 1,440 by 900 of the MacBook Air or the 1,600 by 900 of the Asus Zenbook UX31-RSL8 ($1,049 list, 4 stars). Its viewing angles are slightly narrow; once or twice we found ourselves wishing we could tilt the screen back a fraction further. On the positive side, the display's colors are vivid and it's exceptionally bright; Dell advertises 300 nits but we would have guessed more?you can turn the backlight fully halfway down, not just a notch or two, without things getting dingy.

The eye-pleasing screen is matched by a finger-friendly keyboard, with slightly scalloped keys and a precise, slightly clicky design that avoids the too-shallow typing feel of some ultrabooks. The keyboard lacks dedicated Home, End, PgUp, and PgDn keys (they're doubled up on the cursor arrows) and the seldom used context-menu key, but provides a bright LED backlight for typing in dim environments. The large touchpad works smoothly; its lower left and right corners serve as nicely tactile mouse buttons.

Features
The Dell XPS 13 hits the wireless trifecta with 802.11n Wi-Fi (which worked perfectly in our tests), Bluetooth, and Intel's Wireless Display (WiDi) for zapping video and audio to an HDTV set equipped with a Belkin ScreenCast or Netgear Push2TV adapter. Speaking of audio, the ultrabook's is surprisingly clear and crisp.

From being lavish with features, however, the XPS 13 abruptly becomes a minimalist when it comes to input/output ports: There's a USB 2.0 port and headset jack on the laptop's left side, and a USB 3.0 port and Mini DisplayPort alongside a handy pushbutton-and-LED battery gauge on the right. You'll look in vain for VGA or HDMI video; for an Ethernet port for connecting to wired office networks; or for a memory-card slot, as tempting as it would be to slip the Dell into your digital camera bag.

By contrast, the ultrabook I/O champ, the Toshiba Portege Z830-S8302 ($1,429 list, 3.5 stars), makes room for all four of the above?VGA, HDMI, Ethernet, and a card reader?in a 2.5-pound chassis, and most competitors manage at least an HDMI port. Dell sells a USB Ethernet adapter for $30 and Mini DisplayPort to HDMI and VGA adapters for $30 and $37, respectively, so it's not the end of the world, but it's a gripe if you dislike dongles.

After subtracting a system-recovery partition and the software preload, the 128GB SSD has about 75GB free. Happily, there's no bloatware to speak of, unless you count Skype, Microsoft Office Starter 2010, and a McAfee Internet Security trial. Dell boosts the XPS 13's one-year warranty with a year of in-home or -office service after remote diagnostics, accidental damage service, and LoJack for Laptops theft protection.

One of the XPS 13's neatest features is one that Intel has touted as part of its ultrabook "sleep instead of switch off" specification but that we haven't seen in person before: Smart Connect technology, which lets the laptop periodically wake itself from sleep mode (you set the interval from 5 to 60 minutes), as long as it's connected to a trusted Wi-Fi or wired network, to check your Outlook email and calendar, TweetDeck feed, or other active applications so the latest data is waiting for you when you reawaken the ultrabook and return to work. We tried it briefly with Gmail and it worked like a charm?we can see Smart Connect saving minutes every morning.

Performance

As mentioned earlier, the Dell XPS 13 is built around a 1.6GHz Intel Core i5 processor, the "Sandy Bridge" model i5-2467M, and the same Intel HD 3000 integrated graphics used in all ultrabooks to date. The hardware posted first-class overall performance with a score of 3,535 in our PCMark 7 benchmark test, ahead of the HP Folio 13's score of 3,146 (and behind the Asus UX31-RSL8's result of 3,634, but our Asus test unit had a slightly quicker 1.7GHz CPU instead of the 1.6GHz chip used in models on sale today).

The XPS 13 also shone in the 3DMark06 graphics test, though like all ultrabooks it's built for productivity instead of 3D gaming?the system managed only 17 and 15.2 frames per second at medium settings in Crysis and Lost Planet 2, respectively.

Thanks to its SSD, the XPS 13 also boots up and resumes from sleep in a flash?well, a few flashes, since we couldn't equal Dell's claims of 8 and 1 seconds, respectively; booting from cold till the last taskbar icon appeared took about 20 seconds, but waking from sleep took a snappy 2 seconds.

Dell claims almost nine hours of battery life for the XPS 13. Unfortunately, our MobileMark 2007 battery rundown test failed to run. But based on the battery's size (47Wh) and our real-world testing, we estimate about six and a half hours for real-world productivity work. In strenuous or worst-case anecdotal testing, word processing and Web surfing in the foreground while Windows Media Player looped a five-minute, full-screen video in the background, the XPS 13 lasted 3 hours 40 minutes. We'll update this review after we get MobileMark to run, but the XPS 13's battery life seems in line with other ultrabooks.

Update 3/2/12: Our estimate was fairly close?MobileMark 2007 reported a runtime of 5 hours 58 minutes. That's in the ballpark with the Asus UX31-RSL8 and MacBook Air 13-inch, though it trails the 7:33 of the HP Folio 13.

There will be a flood of new ultrabooks coming with the arrival of Intel's "Ivy Bridge" processor update this year, but Dell has set the bar very high without needing new silicon. If it had just one or two of the missing ports we groused about?say HDMI and a card reader?the Dell XPS 13 would be spectacular; as is, if you don't mind carrying a dongle or two, it's an ultra-small, ultra-sophisticated choice that shoots to the top of ultrabook shopping lists.

BENCHMARK TEST RESULTS:

COMPARISON TABLE
Compare the Dell XPS 13 with several other laptops side by side.

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